BREAKING: Hospital CEO resigns

The Gila Regional Medical Center announced in a press release Wednesday afternoon that CEO Brian Cunningham had submitted his resignation. Neither Cunningham nor hospital board chair Jeremiah Garcia detailed any reason for this move in the release.

Cunningham was promoted to the CEO position from Chief Operations Officer in 2013 after a scandal involving a $9 million hospital budget deficit. Leadership attempted to balance the budget by cutting 70 full-time employees to part-time while increasing administration salaries. When that information was revealed by local reporters, it led to the resignation of then-CEO Brian Bentley and nearly all of the existing upper management. In his first year as CEO, Gila Regional saw a financial turnaround and ended $1 million above the line.

“There is no way that I could adequately express my thankfulness for the opportunity to serve GRMC for these past 14 years, and especially for the last three years as CEO,” Cunningham said in the release. “I have learned and grown so much as a result of working side-by-side with all of you, and we have together tackled enormous challenges and achieved some incredible results. I can honestly say to all of you that I gave GRMC everything I had, and I can also honestly say that I got so much more in return from all of you.”

As to his reason for vacating his post, Cunningham simply said it was “time to move on” and that he had confidence in the health care professionals and the hospital board at Gila Regional to carry on.

While no connection between the two occurrences is made in the release, Cunningham’s resignation follows closely behind an attempt to institute a four-mil property tax levy, which was voted down on the November election ballot. The levy would have raised an annual $3.3 million to be earmarked for building maintenance and equipment upgrades at Gila Regional, from revenue to be earned through a slight increase in property taxes countywide. This was to fill some of the, in one year $11 million, reduction in state government reimbursements.

“Our present healthcare environment brings significant challenges to rural hospitals everywhere,” Garcia said in the release. “Our Board along with GRMC’s leadership team and caregivers are finalizing plans for the next phase of our evolution as a community hospital and our focus will remain on implementing the changes necessary to position GRMC to continue to meet its longstanding mission of serving the healthcare needs of our communities.”

The release does not reveal whether Cunningham’s resignation was board motivated.